COVID-era Delayed Time to Surgery for Emergent Orthopaedic Procedures

Area of Science:

• Orthopaedic Surgery
• Pandemic Response
• Healthcare Management

Background:

• The COVID-19 pandemic introduced significant changes to surgical practices, including new testing protocols and workflow alterations.
• These changes potentially impacted the timely delivery of care for emergent orthopaedic conditions.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the time-to-surgery for emergent orthopaedic cases.
• To compare surgical timing and perioperative outcomes between the pre-COVID and COVID-19 eras.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective analysis of 661 emergent orthopaedic cases (308 pre-COVID, 353 COVID-era) between January 2019 and March 2021.
• Data included demographics, perioperative timing, COVID-19 testing status, and urgency classification.
• Comparison of time-to-surgery and operating room times between pre-COVID and COVID-era cases.

Main Results:

• Emergent orthopaedic cases experienced significantly longer time-to-surgery during the COVID-era compared to the pre-COVID-era.
• Even COVID-negative patients faced prolonged surgical delays in the COVID-era.
• COVID-positive patients had longer post-procedure operating room times during the pandemic.

Conclusions:

• The COVID-19 pandemic led to significant delays in initiating emergent orthopaedic surgical procedures.
• Pandemic-related protocols and workflows negatively affected surgical timeliness for urgent orthopaedic cases.
• Further research is needed to mitigate pandemic-related surgical delays in orthopaedics.